Ten Honest Things

I was tagged by Ashly to give 10 honest things about myself. She's right when she says, "Frankly, 'honest things' is just code for 'freak flags.'"

1. I'm absolutely terrified of strong wind - I think this can be traced back to seeing Darby O'Gill and the Little People when I was little.

2. I'm not an animal lover. My kids think I hate the dog. I don't hate her - I just don't like her. She rolls in gross stuff and smells, she sheds, she gets under my feet and begs for food while I'm cooking, she wakes me up in the middle of the night. What's to like?

3. I'm a neat freak when it comes to my pantry. Everything is lined up in rows with each item mostly in its own row. Each item is also turned on a diagonal with a little bit of space between each row so that I can easily peer down the row and see the fronts of each label. Each shelf is labeled with what belongs where (this is necessary when kids help put away groceries), and there is a sign on the door reminding everyone to put things back "exactly" where they belong. And my spices are all alphabetized. The rest of the house may be a wreck, but my pantry is pristine.

4. I'm also a neat freak about my linen closet. It seriously can ruin my day to open the linen closet and see it a mess. It should be one of the few places in the whole house that the kids don't have in constant chaos. For that reason, I'm considering installing a lock on it.

5. I used to cut school with one of my best friends, and nerds that we are, we'd hang out at the book store or the art museum. We'd also go to Neiman Marcus for lunch - mmmmmmm, popovers and strawberry butter at the Zodiac.

6. I tend to be a bit absent-minded. I once drove off and left two of my three (at the time) kids at the high school where I worked. Five minutes later, I thought, "Gee, they're being quiet," glanced in the rearview mirror to see what they were up to, and about had a HEART ATTACK when they weren't there! That was the quickest U-turn I ever pulled!

7. I sometimes act out my dreams. I'm not sure if you'd call it sleepwalking or sleeptalking, but it used to freak Steve out. He's learned not to be offended when I get mad at him for trying to convince me I'm just dreaming when I know whatever I'm doing is real.

8. I am a homebody. Steve once asked me, if I could get on a plane and go anywhere in the world, where would I go, and my answer was the farm.

9. I am good at math. Many, many years ago, I scored a 5 on the AP Calculus test - I only missed one question. But I have also always been a finger counter, go figure.

10. When Ashly does one of these tags, I could almost copy and paste her answers for my own (90% of them apply to me, too). We were raised by mothers who have shown up to family reunions from different parts of the country wearing the same dress, or carrying the same purse, or wearing the same shoes, or wearing the same glasses, . . .

So Ashly, I'm curious, how many of these can you claim as well?